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The Digital Marketing Handbook

Deliver Powerful Digital Campaigns
Simon Kingsnorth • Kogan Page © 2022 • 288 pages

Take-Aways
• Understand the purpose of your website before you build it.
• Focus search engine optimization (SEO) on content, technical ranking factors and links.
• Paid-for search can succeed if you put in the work beforehand.
• To maximize your display advertising, know your target.
• Content marketing generates leads.
• Successful social media marketing relies on the “human touch.”
• Email automation and customer relationship management platforms can increase sales.
• Excellent customer service fuels business success.

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 Recommendation
Increasingly, business growth depends on an effective digital marketing strategy. However, running digital
marketing campaigns can seem daunting, as each brings challenges and pitfalls. This accessible guide by
digital marketing expert Simon Kingsnorth offers a practical, step-by-step approach to digital marketing,
complete with tools, top tips and case studies. From building a website to understanding search engine
optimization, creating paid-for advertising and using social media, Kingsnorth helps you surmount the
complexities of digital marketing and achieve success.

Summary

Understand the purpose of your website before you build it.

If you want your website to connect with your customers, consider what you want to achieve. Is your
main goal to strengthen your brand, reach a wider audience, engage through content, build up a customer
database or sell products?

“The fact is we know what we like but we don’t know what everyone else will like…It only
matters what works for them, not for you.”

After you establish your goal, get to know your audience – its behaviors, demographic, location, interests,
values and opinions. Based on your findings, create six to 12 personas: hypothetical individuals with certain
characteristics who are likely to visit your website. These personas help you map customer journeys for your
website: Who visits your website and what are they looking for?

Consider how you can get them to their desired point quickly and simply. The customer journey determines
the design and hierarchy of your website. Have clear navigation on your page, for example, by including
large headers, bright calls-to-action and by grouping similar content together. Keep forms and messages
brief, because the more decisions a person has to make, the more likely he or she is to leave your site.

Focus search engine optimization (SEO) on content, technical ranking factors and
links.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a critical but complex aspect of digital marketing. Being in the top 10
results for an internet search drives traffic to your site. When you drop to the second page of search results,
you’re unlikely to get clicks. Secret algorithms that can change at any time determine these search results.

“Having the number-one position on a number of keywords that drives a lot of traffic to
your website is great, but if your goal is leads and the traffic doesn’t generate leads, then
you have failed.”

To find the most effective keywords for your site, use tools such as Moz Keyword Explorer or Google Trends
to find keywords related to your content. Often, “long-tail keywords” can be effective – especially if your

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 main keyword is fairly generic. Long-tail keywords are specific words or phrases that target a niche audience
– for example, someone trying to find out where to buy a blue coat in Rome.

Technical ranking factors look at the “core vitals” of your website:

1 . “Largest contentful paint” – This measures the loading time of the largest piece of content, image or
text on your website. Make sure your loading time is less than 2.5 seconds.
2 . “First input delay” – This measures the reaction time of your site: how quickly it responds to a user’s
clicks. Bring this time to under 100 milliseconds.
3 . “Cumulative layout shift” – Text and boxes on your website shift as more and more content, such as
advertisements, loads. This can cause the user to click on links he or she didn’t want to click on.

Your written content should be at least 400 words long. Structure it by including subheadings and link to
other relevant sites. Update your content regularly. Other sites linking to your website can boost your search
ranking. However, be careful, because low-quality sites linking to your site negatively affects your ranking.
This – and buying links – can result in penalties or in search engines dropping your site entirely from their
listings.

Paid-for search can succeed if you put in the work beforehand.

Paid-for search – pay per click or search engine marketing – can bring people to your website. To maximize
your investment, create keyword sets, ads and landing pages relevant to the person searching. For example,
if someone searches for a white dress and your ad for a black dress shows up because you’ve used only
“dress” as a keyword, the user won’t click on your ad. Create an ad for a white dress that takes the user to
a landing page showing a white dress. This results in a high-quality score, which positively affects where
Google places your ad.

“Your landing page should be simple. Strong calls-to-action. It must directly relate to the
keyword and ad they have clicked on.”

When deciding on keywords, consider wider options. For example, what occasions would prompt someone
to search for a white dress? How much money would he or she want to spend? Are there common
misspellings you need to take into account?

Decide whether you want an exact search match, a phrase match or a broad match. An exact match means
your advertising targets a narrow band of likely customers, which might cost you potential customers. A
phrase match means linking other search results to a specific phrase, such as “white dress.” A broad match
means your ad might not be relevant at all to the user and conversions are much lower.

To maximize your display advertising, know your target.

Display advertising creates targeted and effective advertising. Be clear on what you want to achieve. Do
you want to raise awareness of your brand? Or to inspire potential customers to compare you to your
competition and regard you as a good – or even better – alternative? Or to increase brand loyalty among

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 your current customer base? If you seek to raise brand awareness and add new customers, consider which
audiences might have an interest in your product.

“Remember, the key to successful targeting is trial and error.”

“Interest targeting” aims to reach people who show an interest in your offerings. For example, they search
online for a product like yours and are ready to make a purchase. “Demographic targeting” means focusing
on people’s age, gender or location. “Time-based targeting” reaches customers at a specific time during the
day.

Before you create and run a display ad, make sure you have metrics in place to measure your campaign’s
success. These metrics depend on what you’re trying to achieve. For example, if your goal is to gain new
customers, one of your metrics could measure how many add your product to their carts and purchase it. To
ascertain loyalty, measure repeat purchases.

Content marketing generates leads.

Content marketing is a long-term strategy designed to gain new customers by giving them useful, engaging
content. Content marketing also helps you build brand awareness and customer loyalty, and to present
yourself as an authority in your field.

“If there’s one thing experts recommend, it’s that you should always put your reader
first.”

Content can come in many different forms: blog posts, videos, social media posts, podcasts, infographics,
case studies and toolkits. You can distribute your content through your own channels, such as your website,
social media channels or newsletters, or you can go through paid-for channels, such as paid editorials,
sponsored social media campaigns or partnerships, which effectively reach new audiences.

When choosing what topics to cover, gauge your organization’s strengths and what problems it seeks to
solve. What keywords are relevant to both elements? Find niche topics that relate to your main keywords –
covering these will help you stand out from the crowd. Create a content marketing calendar, which details
what content you’ll publish when, and through which channels. Plan as far ahead as possible, but a month
ahead at minimum. Doing so allows you to create the content for at least a month in one go. When you
create your content, make sure it entertains, educates or convinces. Ideally, it does all three.

Successful social media marketing relies on the “human touch.”

Social media marketing has become increasingly popular due to its wide reach, and because it enables
companies to build direct relationships with their audiences. Successful social media marketing depends,
first and foremost, on your understanding of your audience.

Do your research: Learn which platform(s) they’re on, the time of day they’re most likely to use those
platforms, what types of media they prefer, and how they interact with each other and with brands. To build
effective relationships, show the human being behind your posts. Show your personal side, give people the
opportunity to interact with you and present yourself as someone people want to do business with.

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 “Every second, 16.5 new people sign up to a social media platform.”

Consider influencer marketing to promote your brand. Costs for influencer marketing varies depending on,
for example, an influencer’s number of followers, how niche his or her interest is and his or her location.
Instagram, TikTok and YouTube are the best platforms for influencers.

Some platforms lend themselves better than others to organic growth. For example, business pages on
Facebook have limited reach: Even if you have a lot of followers, anything you post only reaches 6.4% of
them. A better option is to have a Facebook group on which you can interact with people directly, offer sneak
peeks and ask for their email addresses as a condition for joining the group. On TikTok, organic growth is
easier because it doesn’t have quite as many users as some of the more established social media networks. To
take advantage of this, post every daily or even several times a day; ensure your videos are informative and
high-quality.

Email automation and customer relationship management platforms can increase

sales.

Email automation allows you to set up automated marketing messages to your customers. Customer
relationship management (CRM) platforms allow you to manage customer data and contact strategies.
Using the two together can reduce your sales cycle, give your customers a better service experience,
provide you with better access to data and increase your conversion rate.

“Compared with traditional emails, automated emails have had 70.5% higher open rates
and 152% greater click-through rates.”

When migrating your customer data into a CRM – for example, from your email programs, your calendar,
your finance system or your social media – make sure you plan sufficient time, define your processes and
fully commit to using the new CRM.

Automated email marketing derives from workflows; user behavior triggers an automated response. For
example, many companies send out an automated email if a user puts a product in his or her cart and
abandons it. Automated emails can include welcome emails, promotional emails, triggered emails or
newsletters. To ensure engagement, your emails should have a meaningful subject line and an eye-catching
pre-header. Don’t be verbose. Be unique and visually appealing, have a responsive design, and incorporate
a call-to-action. The best day to send automated emails is Tuesday; if you send two emails in a week, send
them on Tuesday and Thursday.

Excellent customer service fuels business success.

To build brand loyalty, provide customer service that meets – and ideally exceeds – customer expectations.
Providing outstanding customer service shows you care about your customers and makes them feel
valued and supported. Outstanding customer service leads to positive reviews, which draw new potential
customers.

“Show the customer that they are your top priority – your business depends on it.”

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 Understand what your customers expect of you and your products or service. Admit mistakes and avoid
retaliating in kind if a customer gets angry. Give customers the opportunity to offer positive and negative
feedback through emails, customer contact forms or surveys. Analyze customer support data, such as first
response time, average time to resolution and customer satisfaction scores. Decide which customer service
channel(s) you want to provide.

Having a human being to talk to rather than a chatbot remains a factor for many people when deciding from
whom to buy. Combine the advantages of the 24/7 availability of chatbots with the connection of human
customer service; respond based on experience, and take into account emotions and tone of voice.

When using social media customer service, judge which comments to respond to and which you should
solve in private. Keep your website up to date so customers can find the information they need. Train your
employees to use the right language and to listen well to customers. Hire people who genuinely want to
provide outstanding customer service.

About the Author

Digital marketing expert Simon Kingsnorth also wrote Digital Marketing Strategy.

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